


My Superhero Academia

by everybodyknowsme



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015), 僕のヒーローアカデミア | Boku no Hero Academia | My Hero Academia
Genre: Engineers, F/F, F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-27
Updated: 2020-09-19
Packaged: 2020-09-27 21:07:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 13,561
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20414320
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/everybodyknowsme/pseuds/everybodyknowsme
Summary: Lena didn't go to U.A. to become a hero. And especially not to meet cute girls. But of Course the world wouldn't just let her do, what she wanted.At least she managed not to get involved with these idiots from the economics class. So far.





	1. Damn Wannabe-heroes

Lena hated heroes. No. That wasn't quite right. She did have great respect for those, that willingly put themselves into danger and successfully protected and saved those in need. What she hated, were people, that took on the profession of hero for bragging points or money, people that were plain stupid and needed rescuing themselves. And most of all, those few, who had no idea, what their colleagues went through, because their overpowered quirk carried them through most of the training and any form of conflict without struggle.  
The top students of UA's third-year hero-course, Deku, Shoto and Kacchan, narrowly missed this category, because all three of them became famous, because they constantly fought hard to not only be good or better then someone else, but to be the best, they could possibly be.  
The reason this was on her mind, was because she was in the process of applying for UA's Support Class. Where normally the Hero-Classes were overrun, The bulk applied for the General Studies and even Economics. The reason for this was a change in quirk-legislation. It was now much easier to get a license that allowed for private and commercial quirk use, as well as a rework of self-defense laws, which now categorically allowed the use of quirks in emergencies. The problem for Lena was not the amount of people, that applied for the Hero-Class, but the kind. When she came in she recognized two people in separate groups: Her Ex, whose powerful quirk would allow him to do pretty much all kinds of hero work easily, from protecting bystanders, to defeating villains, to leading the rescue effort, when the battle was over. She presumed that this group was for the wannabe-heroes.  
The other familiar face was James Olsen. The child of a friend of an uncle or something, she just ran into him once a year. His quirk was Photomemory: when he blinked he could create a photograph in his mind. Everything that had been in his field of vision at this point in time remained perfectly preserved in his mind, potentially forever. He could emit a bright flash of light, to have better visibility and he could remove a picture from his mind, by printing it. When he did that, he could control how large the print would be, and where it would come out of his Body. Thar always caused him slight disorientation, because of the memory loss.  
Why would someone with that quirk try to become a hero?!  
“Hey Linda, are you to here to become a hero?”  
“It's Lena, and no, don't tell me you are!”  
“Why not? I want to protect people, and unlike nerds like Winn and you, I can't do that from behind a workbench!”  
“I still have no idea, who Winn is.”  
James pointed to a small boy excitedly talking with her ex. She considered her options and before James could introduce her to the bimbo he had been talking to, Lena was gone.

“Hi, Jack!”  
“Lena, nice to see you! Are you applying for support as well?”  
“What else? Economics? Don't insult me! But why aren't you in the hero-course? You were always the one going on about making the world a better place and saving everybody. With your quirk you surely should be able to do good work!”  
“Lena,... You know, that that's not who I am, not what I mean when I say 'making the world a better place'. Besides, how would I fight villains? Choke them out? You know I'm not the man that gets physical. And it's not, like I'll be completely benched,” He tapped his head, “Field-Support.”  
The small boy Jack had been talking to got visibly scared: “I can't go out in the field! I would die!”  
“Relax, nobody is expecting you to fight. It's about getting critical hardware working while under stress,” Jack comforted him. He turned back to Lena: “I haven't introduced you yet. Lena Luthor, this is Winn Schott.”  
They both shock back, recognizing the other ones name.  
“You made Agent's costume!”  
“You are Lex Luthor's sister!” By now Lena was adept in hiding her emotions about her brother, however Winn could still see Jack's reaction.  
“I didn't really make her costume. I have no idea, why I got credited”, he said to avoid the subject.  
“I knew, that the fiber had already been invented, but didn't you design?”  
“No, and I also wasn't the first one, to figure out the folding technique to prevent exposed seams, which some papers attributed to me, either.”  
“You didn't make the material, you didn't design it, you didn't create the manufacturing process,... What did you do?”  
“I was interning at the company that had the order for the suit. My instructor had just shown me how to work with heavy weave and left me alone to practice. In the room where the draft for her suit was. And a few unlabeled drawers with different fibers and weaves. And patterns of other suits, with similar designs. Literally the next tailor that took a look at the draft would've done nearly the same.”  
“And here I thought I was talking to Agent's support prodigy!”, Jack laughed.  
“You're not totally wrong. I'm not her support, when she is on duty, but we still met and I'm somewhat of a friend now.”  
“You actually know Agent?”, Lena was a huge fan of the highly efficient heroine, who despite just graduating last year had already broken the record for the most successful operations, per year.  
“Is it true, that she's now a literal agent?”  
“She obviously doesn't share confident information on the dinner table, but yes. She was recruited by some intelligence organization. She didn't even say, which one.”  
“I take it, she is the reason, you are now here?”  
“Actually that's her sister, Kara's fault. If it wasn't for Ale... I mean Agent, she would've made me apply for the hero course as well.”  
“You seem more nervous about yourself, than her”, Lena observed.  
“I don't need to worry about her. She got the will.”  
Now Jack got concerned: “You are aware, that the entrance exam for the heroes is dangerous, yes? I heard they even ramped it up, because to many parents trained their kids specifically to pass!”  
“No need to worry. She's good enough for all the applicants to pass. Kara can you just come over? I want to introduce you.” Lena and Jack were dumbfounded. Winn had not said the last part any louder and by now it had become quite crowded in the entrance hall.  
And suddenly she was beside him. The bimbo James had been talking to.  
“Hey Winn. I just met this cool guy, that can make fotos, whenever he wants!...”  
She started gushing excitedly until Winn interrupted her: “Kara, I want to introduce you to my likely future classmates Jack Spheer and Lena Luthor! Jack, Lena, this is Kara!”  
Lena had expected the blonde's perk to be teleportation and was surprised, when she felt herself and Jack picked up in a hug as if they were pillows. Jack didn't like being that close and dissolved his body to reform about a meter away from Kara. She immediately dropped Lena.  
“Wow, that looks so cool! Do you turn into tiny insects, or...”, she squinted, “No you are always like that! Does that mean, you can't be killed? I mean if I just froze your arm, there is no blood or anything in terms of circulation, so you could just like regrow it? Or is your mass fixed?”  
Jack laughed awkwardly: “Yes, I am a swarm of nanobots. No I am not immortal. Yes, any attack will only affect the bots, that are hit. No, I produce more bots, but the more I am, the harder it is to control my body, which eats at my intelligence, so the more I use at a time, the dumber I am.”  
“That's still really useful. I bet working on micro-technology is really easy for you, though you'd make a great hero with that quirk!”  
“Yes, it comes in handy when working, but I don't have the character to go on the front lines. What about your quirk? Something like teleportation?”  
“What? No, I'm just fast.”  
“It didn't seem like you pushed anybody.”  
Winn spoke up with a grin: “And she can fly, and shoot laser beams from her eyes, and create freezing winds by blowing out air, and she's super strong and she's nearly indestructible.”  
The girl was smiling awkwardly, on one side obviously proud of her talents, on the other side aware of how those around her felt.  
“Are you one of those Nomou?”, Lena asked. She had meant it as a joke, but Kara seemed to have a hard time registering that:  
“No! Nomou are black! I don't even have black hair! How do I know, you're not a Nomou? Why would a Nomou enroll in the hero-course? There are no more Nomou! They were all killed, when”  
“It was a joke, Kara. It is even among mutated perks unusual, that they manifest with such divers effects like your powers”, Winn stopped her rambling.  
Before they could talk any more the bell rang, calling them into the halls, where they would receive the instructions for their respective entrance exams.

To their surprises, they all went into the same hall. Present Mic was already on stage, shouting to get everyone seated and quiet as quickly as possible.  
“HIIII STUDENTS!” He used his quirk to shut the last whispers up, then continued to talk 'normally': “You are here, because you applied for one of our prestigious courses! As you must have realized, we have an unusually small number of applicants this year, however we will not lower our standards, just to fill empty seats! Instead we see this as an opportunity to save time, by making all exams simultaneously! I will now explain the parameters of your exams! As soon as you heard the explanation directly relevant to you, I would like you to quietly leave to prepare yourself!  
I will start with the heroes: You will be given a pouch”, he held up a bag that could be pulled shut by a string, that could also be used to tie it to a belt,  
“You will have to keep yours with you until the end of the exam. The goal is to fill it with these transponders”, he showed three different colored devices the size of marbles.  
“They are on or inside of these robots, on per bot! If they are removed after the robot is destroyed, they become active and count as Points! The number printed on the robots tell you, how much they are worth! You score by getting as many of them as you can into your pouch! The benchmark to pass is 15 points!  
NOW! Don't take this lightly! It's not as easy as simply destroying a bunch of robots! You also have to defend your points from your competitors and”, suddenly there were six more people on the stage. Almost everybody recognized Kacchan.  
“These volunteers from our third year will play villains. They are tasked with keeping your points at zero. They are allowed to attack the robots and destroy the transponders, if nobody had managed to claim them yet. They are allowed to attack you and take your points, with one small restriction: as long as the pouch is still on your person, they are not allowed to take anything out, but as soon as they make you drop it or take it from you, you can start from scratch.  
Naturally they know the position of the bag with the most points at all times! Kacchan, I believe you want to give them something on their way?”  
The explosive boy stepped forward with a wide grin: “I WILL KILL ALL OF YOU, UNLESS YOU STOP ME! SO GET GOING!”  
With that he blasted off the stage through the door to the arena. His classmates quickly followed suit.  
The wannabe-heroes got the message and panicked out.

“And now the support exam! Everyone of you will get a radio! On the other side is someone that needs something fixed! Maybe he needs data extracted from a computer or equipment repaired! Your job is to make sure it gets done! At your starting position we have all equipment, you could possibly need and more! You will be evaluated on multiple things, mainly how quickly you get your job done, and how effectively you do! Of course there are ways, to earn extra-credit, but don't count on that to pass! Now off you go!”

“Does your perk allow you to avoid damage?”, Lena asked Winn.  
“Not really. I can turn transparent, but only if I don't move. Why do you ask.”  
“Because I didn't want to run through that battlefield, if I could avoid it, and I don't want to ask Jack for help.”  
“Wait, we are tested at the same time and place as the hero-course?”  
“Of course. Pretty smart. It's hard to measure the mental abilities of an inventor under normal circumstances, so instead they test our behavior under stress.”  
She was handed a headset and focused on the voice: “Hi, I need this thing fixed.”  
Lena couldn't shake the feeling, that the voice was familiar, but business came first: “Sir, please describe your issue!”  
“How should I know what's what? Hatsume strapped this thing on me and said it would help me dodge attacks and now I nearly got killed!”  
“So a piece of wearable equipment is not working. Did it work before?”  
“I just switched it on before the mission but it didn't do anything.”  
“Do you know, how it is supposed to work? Have you ever observed it working?”  
“I can't remember, but she kept bragging, how it did her proud during the sports festival.”  
“Thank you Sir, I can work with that! Can you describe your position to me, while I work out how I can help you?”  
The man gave her coordinates, which he corrected twice before telling her to ignore them. While that happened Lena went through the recordings of the past three sport-festivals, until she found Mei Hatsume in her first year showing of her gear in a duel against Ingenium.  
The man gave her a street name, then apologized, the sign must have been thrown around by the battle. Lena packed some tools and a battery pack. The most likely cause for the problem was, that after three years since its construction nobody had bothered to check its energy supply.  
She turned to the arena just in time to see Kacchan blasting a flying opponent, likely Kara, through a tower with such force, that the entire building fell over.  
“Do you see the falling tower?”  
“Don't worry, it's falling away from me.”  
“I am trying to find you! Are you close to that building?”  
A deafening noise came out. So he was just on the other side of the street.  
Lena started running into the chaos.

She seriously considered asking Jack for help. After getting half the way, she already had to be rescued five times, thrice by James of all people. That alone would not have stopped her of course. But there were also the others. She had rescued three other kids, that gotten themselves into a predicament or another. She had quickly learned to use her headset for noise cancellation, which came in handy when she encounter a kid confronting a group of other kids. Whatever he did, it seemed to be based on sound, because the only one still conscious, was the one that had his hands over his ears instead of his mouth and nose like the others. Lena decided to knock the attacker out, which promptly caused the others to wake up and take big gulps of air, as if they had been drowning.

She finally reached her contact and she took a moment to realize, who she had been talking to: She still had not gotten used to All Might no longer being the invincible symbol of justice. He also was not showing his boastful behavior, he was known for, though Lena had no idea, whether he was just currently playing an act, he had gotten rid of it, or it had never been him to begin with.  
“Do not worry, I AM HERE!” Lena simply could not have resisted the temptation.  
Even though she expected him to react with frustration, He chuckled: “It's been some time, since someone did that. You can fix my problem?”  
“Yes, can you take the device off?”  
Lena got to working on the device. It consisted of a proximity sensor and basically two extendable stilts. As she had suspected, the energy source had given out, but in addition there was dust in the sensor, which prevented it from working and because it had been switched on and worn in a battle environment, while the battery for the stilts had been offline, a few mechanical parts of the inner workings had to be reset. 37 Seconds later and it was operational again.  
“That should be it.” Lena helped All Might putting it back on.  
“I better test it, before I get back”, she said. She got behind him and kicked at his position. The stilts extended as they should and moved the former hero above her foot, before she could make contact.  
“Excellent work, young one!”, All Might was now showing his famous boastful attitude, “I got your time written up and Hatsume will evaluate your work. Now get out of here, so you can watch the rest of the exam on the screens!”


	2. Damn offers

Lena hated this test. She had not gotten three meters back, when a loud siren could be heard and Present Mic's voice announced, that the test would only continue for one more minute and all hell broke lose.  
Suddenly there was a giant robot right on her route back. Under normal circumstances, she could easily walk around it, but because all the buildings, that would've provided cover and hindered its movement, were strewn all about, She had to either run straight past it, or go a long way around. She intended to live.  
She encountered another kid stuck in debris, so she stopped and jury-rigged a spreader to get him out. To her surprise, there were still those bots around, that were worth points. She saw groups of students fighting over who got to finish them off, because this person had obviously the best chance at scoring the points. Lena mused, how many points worth of bots were there in total, turned a corner and found herself face to face with a 3-point model.  
She got into cover behind a trash container just in time to avoid taking fire. She could not run back, or she'd just get hit in the back. She could scream for help, but over the overall noise it was unlikely, that anybody would actually come. In the tight alleyway the machine couldn't turn. She quickly filled plastic bag, in which she kept lose screws and nuts, with thermal compound and glue. If she got in a hit, it would severely distort the readings of its sensors. Depending how it reacted she could then either run past or use the spreader to liberate it from its armor and destroy it.  
Then the trash container got flipped over.  
She wanted to run, but remembered, how the machine identified its targets. She threw the old battery, she had removed from All Might's device at the flying container and the machine blew it to bits.  
She was nearly directly in front of it and threw her 'molotov'.  
“Shit!”  
The robot did no longer identify her correctly as a target, like she had hoped. But it instead identified pretty much everything as a target. It's arms flailing wildly. She had to destroy it.

Logically, Lena knew, what she had just done: she had gotten close to the machine, rammed her spreader into a joint of the left weapon-arm, which had then broken off. Then she turned the barrel towards the former joint, shorted the contact and so destroyed the villain-bot with its own weapon.  
But her brain did not know, how she was not dead, whether she was still running the right way or why she had taken the transponder.  
When the adrenalin somewhat subsided, she realized, that she was indeed nearly back, and that she could just give the transponder the next person she ran into.  
That person was James of all people, who had just thrown a piece of concrete a 1-point bot, presumably to get it away from someone even more helpless.  
And now he was helpless himself. He blinked in an attempt to blind it, which, since it had no organic eyes, naturally didn't work.  
Lena's body began moving, so she had to make a plan. This model was much weaker, but also more agile than the one she had just destroyed. That meant crippling would be easier, but not cause as much damage. While still running, she threw a wrench at the wheel immediately throwing the robot off balance and causing it to fall. She jumped on its back wielding her trusty spreader like crowbar, prying the 'head' from the body.  
“Wow, and here I thought I was good at fighting without a quirk”, James congratulated her as he salvaged the transponder.  
“James, get out of here! You're not made for this!”  
“A hero can't choose his battles. I still need a few points.”  
She threw her transponder at his head. “A hero HAS to choose his battle! Choosing a battle and running away are not the same.” While he had caught and pocketed the transponder she had grabbed him and was pulling him along with her.  
“The police could someone like you, or maybe you could go into journalism! You'd help arguably even more and your quirk would actually come in handy!”  
It should have made her suspicious, that he did not protest, but instead smiled and went along with her.

She made it back at the last second. To her annoyance she was informed, that whether or not she was back by the end of the exam did not affect her grade in any way.  
The written test was laughably easy to the point, where she nearly asked, whether she had been given the one for the economics-course.  
“You are in radio-contact with a hero close to the engine of an out of control train. The hero wants to block the wheels directly beneath him, to stop the train. The train is going at 120 km/h. Behind the engine there are three passenger wagons, two cargo wagons and finally another engine. In 63 kilometers the tracks end. What do you advise?” That translated to about half an hour. In that time the hero should be easily able to switch of both engines and then use the brakes from the back forwards. Other questions were simple calculus and algebra. It took her a while until she understood, that those easy text-question were in fact reading-comprehension tests.

Afterwards she was given a waiver. The first part was an evaluation of the practical exam. She got ready to write a scathing review, when she saw, that the ratings to gauge the danger of various aspects of the exam ranged from “very dangerous” to “I was injured to the point I was unable to take the written exam”. Behind that there was a field for other. She filled out the waiver honestly, noting, that the location was no more dangerous than a real city. While she did admit, that the test provided a realistic challenge, she amended that the realism was not worth the danger for non-heroes.  
At the bottom were two check-boxes: “I want to receive a record and a detailed breakdown of my performance with my message of acceptance/rejection” and “I want to receive the top 10 list and the supercut/best-of off this years practical”.  
She ticked both boxes. Whether she liked it or not, she would have to work with these students, so she had to find out how they fought. She submitted the waiver and made her way home. If she stayed, she risked getting involved in a conversation.

She paced up and down in the entrance-hall. She was not worried, that she had failed. The written test had been easy and she had no idea how she could have performed better in the practical exam. She could have saved a bit of time, by not helping those other kids, she had encountered, but a few seconds were worth her peace of mind.  
“You do not belong with these people.”  
Any indication of her underperforming would be taken by her mother as a reason to enroll her in a different school. A business school, where she would learn to be a nice little CEO, so she could look after the finances of her brother's other companies he had no intention of leading himself.  
“Hold your mockery, until the results are here, mother. Lena does have some ingenuity and she was smart enough not to apply for the hero-course. She might get accepted.”  
And then she wouldn't get away from her brother, for whom she was nothing more than a benchmark to prove to himself, that he was the best. The man, that somehow became a popular hero, despite openly being in it for fame and money, who quit, as soon as he inherited dads companies.  
She heard the postman coming in his car. She stormed out and took the letter from his hand, before he could put it in the mailbox. She could feel, that it contained three objects: her letter of acceptance, a thumb drive, likely containing the requested recordings, and an unknown third object. Before her mother or brother could see it, she took out the thumb drive and hid it in her sleeve. She recognized the third object to be a message projector, that could show a recorded message as a hologram. To her surprise, there were two sheets of paper. Before she could read them, her mother had taken them.  
“What is this? Why were you accepted into the hero-course? I thought you only applied to the support-course!”  
The projector started up: Power-loader was there, facing the camera: “Hello Ms. Luthor. You are probably wondering, why you received two letters of acceptance. I am sure it is no surprise to you, that you passed your entrance exam for the support-course with a perfect score. For the other letter... I'll let him explain.”  
Power-loader vanished and All-Might took his place: “I AM HERE! You did a wonderful job during the practical exam. While sighting all our material for the supercut, something became evident: You have, what it takes to be a hero! I know, what you are thinking! At least some of it. 'Didn't they read my file?' And I admit, that it is rare for people to become pro-heroes without being able to rely on their quirk. But there is one characteristic, that you share with all great heroes: you cannot stand by, when someone needs help! Furthermore you've shown the battlefield awareness, reaction-time and ingenuity even plenty of pros are lacking. So what we did, was applying the same metrics to you, that we did to the other hero-students, and the results speak for themselves:” A screen popped up:  
“Killpoints: 4  
Transponders: 0  
Rescuepoints: 50  
Total: 54  
Points to pass: 30”  
All-Might came back: “Now, I can't know, what is going through your head, but one thing I can say for sure: If you had to decide now, you wouldn't like your choice, whether it was the right one or not. Promise me this: honestly think about it and then, in two weeks, when it's time to move into the dorms, make your decision.”  
Both her mother and her brother were still stunned by the message, so she could snatch the letters back and run into her room.  
With the door locked, realization set in. She could be a hero without even trying? No! She plugged the thumb drive in and put on headphones. Her performance-breakdown was a text-document. She was applauded for quickly assessing which tools she would need, before going out as well doing an excellent job at navigating the field. They were furthermore impressed with her repairs and that she had remembered to test her work, before running back. The exam had three different aspects: how helpful the contact was, how easy he was to reach and how easy his problem was to fix. According to the breakdown, her job had been one of the hardest in all three categories. There was another breakdown, that evaluated her actions from the hero perspective: She had received 'only' 50 rescue-points, because she had never put herself in to much danger to save others, but made up for it in numbers. Her battlefield-awareness, while never directly graded was considered good. While it wasn't particularly heroic to avoid fights she could win, it was stupid to seek them out, when she would needlessly endanger herself to nobodies benefit in doing so.  
Her recording had few surprises. She remembered every camera, through which she was now watching herself and even saw her past self looking into the camera a few times.

The supercut was similar to a gag reel. Most of it was of Kara. There was a segment, where the audio had been replaced with that of the mock-documentary 'Honey badger don't care', while the screen showed the girl tanking bullets, flying debris and explusions. The next segment showed the arena trap turning its head facing Kara, who was being pursued by Kacchan. The frame froze and a narrator proclaimed: “It was at this moment he realized, he fucked up.” Then the video resumed and showed Kara piercing through the head and Kacchan exploding the rest. There was a blueish boy, that jammed his hand into a 3-point bot, which then proceeded to shoot down a small army of other robots. A girl, that looked to be about three years younger than the rest of them, swung something like a whip or chain of light. A black boy, whose quirk appeared to be similar to Kacchans, creating large explosions and flames from his body. To her amusement there was a small montage, apparently mocking James. It showed several instances of him 'saving' somebody only for him to be forced to run, with the words “Oh shit!” written over the screen. The last one ended with her throwing her transponder at him, with the word “Pathetic!” coming from her. The video paused again and a red arrow pointed at her backpack: “Wait, she's support! How did she?” Then it showed it. In detail. With text fawning about how smart and badass her actions were and the audio heavily invoking a few anime-tropes.  
The video ended with the top 10 list scrolling upwards into frame. The first was no surprise:  
“1. Kara Danvers:  
Killpoints: 61  
Transponders: 16  
Rescuepoints: 48  
Total: 125”  
Lena was confused for a few seconds, until she remembered, that rescue-points were dependent on how much the rescuer was risking for the rescued. What presumably had happened was, that after getting 16 transponders, Kara just flew around to help her colleagues. With her points already in the sack and being nearly invulnerable, any individual rescue would be value quite low. The list continued:  
“2. Barry Allen:  
Killpoints: 53  
Transponders: 55  
Rescuepoints: 11  
Total: 119  
3\. Qerl Dox:  
Killpoints: 40  
Transponders: 40  
Rescuepoints: 6  
Total: 86  
4\. Nia Nal:  
Killpoints: 20  
Transponders: 18  
Rescuepoints: 20  
Total: 68  
5\. Jefferson Jackson & Martin Stein:  
Killpoints: 20  
Transponders: 20  
Rescuepoints: 20  
Total: 60  
...”  
And then Lena nearly fell off her chair.  
“10. Lena Luthor:  
Killpoints: 4  
Transponders: 0  
Rescuepoints: 50  
Total: 54  
11\. Roy Harper:  
Killpoints: 18  
Transponders: 15  
Rescuepoints: 14  
Total: 47”  
Lena quickly opened her browser. Like she had feared, the supercut had already been uploaded, with the list at the end. She wouldn't be able to avoid talking about becoming a hero, even though her intentions about doing so had not changed. She checked the comments. While the bulk of the admiration went to Kara, after a few comments of 'Snu Snu' and speculations about her hero-name, there was not much more to add. As a consequence the comments discussing Lena were far to high up for her comfort.  
She did the only logical thing and programmed a bot to spam downvotes on every comment containing her name, so they would get burried.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In case you're wondering: the top ten list has a gap, because I'm really bad at coming up with names, and no other non-original character made the list.


	3. First day of school

Despite coming as early as possible to move into the dormitory there were already kids watching her expectantly. Of course she had not been able to erase the knowledge from her fellow pupils. The way Kara's face fell when Lena walked past her after greeting her almost broke her heart. Winn and Jack were standing in front of the dorm and cheered. A girl that looked eerily similar to Kara laughed at the hero-course, before turning red and rambling about being caught up in a competitive mood.  
Kara came over regardless: “Hi... again.”  
“Hi”, Lena replied.  
“So,... you stayed with the support-course?”  
“Of course. I'm not the kind of person that that throws herself in front of the helpless.”  
“... Are you sure? Because on stick I got it looks like...”  
“Fine, I saved James, but that was different...”, before Lena could come up with an excuse the main entrance opened and non other than James exited, accompanied by a large green man.  
Winn saluted and Kara seemed to recognize him as well: “J'onn!”  
“Stop it both of you. I am Manhunter now.”  
“Excuse me, but what are you doing here,...sir?”, Winn asked.  
“I am this years homeroom teacher of one of the hero-courses. Mr. Olson here is one of my pupils.”  
“Why did you meet just now?”, Lena's blonde classmate asked unafraid.  
Manhunter looked at James who gave a hesitant shrug.  
“Mr. Olson passed the entrance exam with exactly 30 points, not a single kill point, the four transponders were thanks to Ms. Luthor. While rewatching the footage the staff got the impression, that even though it was as close as it could have been, Mr. Olson had been aware, that he had passed. A suspicion, that I could confirm today. Mr. Olson did what many would have considered cheating: he acquired knowledge of the exact metrics, by which he would be measured. While this on its own could be seen as smart preparation there was also the issue, that his quirk was almost useless in most scenarios. Contrary to most of the staff, I firmly believe, that there is no such thing as an inherently weak quirk, only inability to make use of it.  
The conclusion to all of this is, that Mr. Olson is now in my class and on very thin ice. Due to his inability to compete physically with his classmates, he will have stricter grading on his theoretical exams.”  
Lena was speechless. Kara was not: “How can you let someone, that can barely protect himself and cheated on the entrance exam, join the hero-course?”  
“You'd rather have class with Lena than with James?”  
“I... I didn't mean... I mean Lena did get kills...”  
“I had weapons. And I can't exactly use my quirk in combat either.”  
“Which wouldn't be that much of a hindrance”, Manhunter answered, “Nighteye was one of the most effective graduates of UA in its entire history. This is the reason, we offered Ms. Luthor to join the hero course: We were certain, that if she wanted to, she could compensate for physical limitations with her mind. James on the other hand is not a renowned child-genius, but he made enough preparations to pass regardless.”  
-  
Lena managed to keep out of conversations for the rest of the day, but of course she wasn't as lucky on her first actual day of school.  
“Felicity Smoak!”  
“Excuse me?”, Lena answered her blonde classmate who had waited for her in the door frame.  
Apparently she had used all her confidence to confront her, because now she deflated and was genuinely hard to understand.  
“I wanted to talk to you...”  
“I can't exactly go to a public school and expect not being talked to, so... go ahead.” They got in.  
“I know it's quite something personal, but what's your quirk? Everyone who knows you, acts, like you don't have one, but...”, she leaned closer and whispered “is it a dud?”  
“I mean she is not her brother, but I wouldn't call her a dud!”, a latino boy with far to much confidence for Lena's liking shouted, extending his hand to her: “Cisco Ramone, pleased to meat you.”  
Lena remained calm: “Ms. Smoak did not call me a dud, she asked, whether my quirk was one.”  
“A dud?”  
“If your such a Lex fanboy, I would have thought, you'd know that expression”, Winn barged in.  
“Yeah, I'm don't care much about quirk theory, so what is a dud-quirk.”  
Lena explained: “A dud is a quirk, that works in such a way, that there is no functional difference between having it and not having a quirk at all.”  
“So like green foot soles?”  
“No. Like your quirk granting you an extra kidney and having a birth deficit that causes you to have on kidney less, or the ability to regrow your heart, if you are kept alive long enough.”  
“Those sound in no way equal!”  
“How would you ever find out, if your quirk did one of these? The only situation one could lose his heart without dying on the spot would be during a heart transplantation.”  
“And that's your quirk?”  
“I have no idea. That's the point. My brother invented a genetic test, that can tell without doubt whether someone has a quirk and I was one of the few where it came up positive without any discernible deviation from a normal human. It could be, that my teeth are self-cleaning, but since I clean them myself I wouldn't know. Maybe my bonemarrow has a different color. Maybe my brain is indestructible.”  
-  
“Ah, looks like we're complete! My name is Ray Palmer or The Mighty Atom, if you prefer hero names. From today on forward I'll be your homeroom teacher. I was very pleased to learn, that this years bunch seemed to be an exceptionally capable group, so after we've taken some time getting to know each other, we can hop right in!”, the teacher had been sitting on the table the entire time and had now returned to not quite full size being right now about as tall as they were.  
He pointed at Cisco: “Why don't you start? Just tell us your name, quirk if you want, why you signed up, hobbies, the works; then we continue through the rows.”  
“Hi, I'm Cisco Ramone. My quirk is resonance. I can amplify waves. I always loved engineering and when Barry, signed up for the hero-course I knew, what I wanted to do.”  
“My name is Winslow Schott Jr., but please just call me Winn”, he was interrupted by shouts of “not now that you told us.”  
“My friend Kara basically dragged my to UA and luckily I could convince her that being translucent when motionless doesn't qualify for hero work, and well yeah...”  
“Felicity Smoak, … good with computers, … I can see interfaces”, there were demands to elaborate.  
“Has one of you tinkered with their phone?” several devices were held up.  
“You added two micro-usb-ports, where the SD-Slot was,... somehow. You two jailbreaked,.. jailbroke? You're running Linux on a virtual machine on your phone, for some reason. And that's not a bought phone you tinkered with, that's selfmade, it's strongly partitioned so spyware can't access anything. Yeah, soldering, adapters, drivers, if it's an interface I can see it.”  
“I am Lena Luthor, I'm functionally quirkless and opposite to my brother I genuinely want to help people and am fine with not standing in the limelight.”  
She sat back down again. There was silence. Of course her statement was slightly at odds with the fact, that she had been on the top 10, but logically everybody present was aware, that 1. she had had no control over that 2. performing well was no contradiction to not doing it for praise and 3. the fact that she was now here supported her claim.  
The next was an elderly man, that somehow had managed to not attract everybody's attention until now: “Good Morning. I am professor Martin Stein. Some of you might have picked up, that me and Jefferson Jackson were put on the same spot. This has to do with our quirks. Put simply, without each other, we'd both suffer from rapid nuclear deterioration, which would kill both us and everything in a six mile diameter around each of us. A fate which I had managed to stave off so far thanks to my aptitude in nuclear physics and no small amount of artificial proton-bombardment. When the two of us superimpose we have all the powers of a small star. Since the work of a hero is one of the few jobs that make use of both his learned as well quirk-related skills, I had no good argument against him choosing this path. So naturally I decided to train to be a good supporter.”  
Everyone was speechless for a few moments.  
“Alright, let's get started with the first lesson! Follow me to the sports-field”  
–  
“Ok, Manhunter is doing the Quirk Apprehension Test with his class. You will each draw two names. If it's the same name twice, please redraw. Observe, how their quirk works and how they use it. Then I want you, to design a costume, only a rough draft mind you, and try to come up with gadgets or utility items, that they should carry on themselves. Then you present them in front of your classmates, who will try to scrutinize them.”  
Lena drew Barry Allen and Nia Nal. Professor Stein protested for while, that he didn't get to work for Jackson, but admitted in his position, he should take as much outside-perspective as possible.  
“One last thing: of course you are allowed to ask them about their quirks all you like.”  
-  
“How do you do that frost-breath?”, Felicity asked Kara.  
“I just blow. It's the same principle, why the nozzles of gas bottles get cold.”  
“But they have much more pressure, than you could possibly have in your lungs?!”  
“A, yes my lungs are kind of weird. They are divided so I can pressurize them. I'm most comfortable at 25 bar, but I can go up to 6 kbar if I have to hold my breath.”  
“You can inhale 240 as much air as you need, if you want?”  
“Yes? Normally I only breath once every few minutes.”  
-  
“Ehm, Barry? Are you also super resilient? You didn't seem to get injured, when you tripped.”  
“Not really, Lena. You see my quirk essentially works like special relativity, but linear instead of logarithmically.”  
“You didn't look that much shorter.”  
Barry laughed: “Okay not much like relativity. You see, when I go at a speed, time slows down in linear proportion. That means, by moving my legs as fast as I can, I can perpetually increase my speed, but for me it feels the same as sprinting. It has some wonkyness to it, for example I can stay in this state for what feels like hours, even though I'm constantly sprinting and from what I can tell I'm not suffering from accelerated aging, but even though I have to eat proportionally less, I still have to eat much more than a normal human and my sense of hunger only works properly, when I'm slow or still.”  
Lena had to snicker: “Sorry, I just imagined you running at supersonic speed and suddenly passing out from hypoglycemia.”  
Barry smiled: “It happened. Not as fun as it looks like, not as bad as it sounds like.”  
–  
“Okay the biggest threats to Barry Allen, once he got some speed, are hypoglycemia and dehydration. So my design contains a blood-monitor and pouches with glucose-pills and water bottles. Aside from that, he is most vulnerable, when he's just getting started, so the boots must be designed to allow for best possible acceleration on all surfaces and needs access to a map at all times, so he can find both stretches, to accelerate on as well as finding his way, to where he needs to go, because contrary to most heroes, he will not be right at the action, when his job starts.”  
“That's some good work on the gadgets, Lena”, Cisco started his presentation, showing a red overall with lightning motif.  
“But shoes, a lunchbox and google-glasses don't make for a good costume.”  
-  
“You can't be serious!”, all girls in the class shouted, when Winn revealed his draft for Kara's costume.  
“What?”  
“Upskirting already happens to people, who are on the ground, how bad do you think it'll be with a flying girl?”, Felicity explained, pointing on the problematic article of clothing.  
“An oversight, I admit it, fixed easily enough though. But you picked the wrong material!”  
“What's wrong with spandex or neopren? It's not like she needs armor”  
“Nothing, if you're dressing an athlete. But how long do you think this'll keep her covered, when she's under fire?”  
Lena raised her hand.  
“Ms. Luthor?”, Mr. Palmer called her.  
“Didn't you notice her scar?”  
The entire class was puzzled.  
“Kara has a small scar above her eye. But as Felicity explained, she has a body altering quirk, so she should have been invulnerable from birth. The place suggests, that it was an accident, which leaves only one conclusion for me: She has something she is for lack of better word allergic to. A material that can either negate or bypass her natural sturdiness. Especially the former case would be devastating.”  
“Your reasoning is a bit thin, but the mistake you pointed out stands: everything has a weakness. Out job is to protect against it. Both Ms. Smoak and Mr. Schott simply accepted Ms. Danvers to be without weakness, meaning if she was ever confronted with something, that got through her skin, she would be unequipped to handle it. There is another mistake you made, though it's not as much of a flaw as not using a strength. I'll give you a hint.” He pointed at his own costume, which looked like a suit of armor, jam-packed with all kinds of weapons and gimmicks.  
Professor Stein spoke up: “Due to her basically unlimited strength and her flight, you can put anything that is useful on her suit without considering weight or balance.”  
“Very good Mr.... Professor Stein.”  
-  
This went on for some time. Some powers, like Nia Nal's astral projection were to confusing to effectively design auxiliaries for them, while others like Roy Harper's ability to fire projectiles from his arm naturally lent themselves to certain gadgets, in his case a visor, so he could precisely tell where he was aiming. Especially James caused heated discussion. Someone suggested a bus ticket, so he could leave UA as a gadget, but Mr. Palmer reprimanded them, that as long as he was on the course, the were to take him seriously.  
Then the practical part began: they each drew one name again and received the designs that the hero students themselves had turned in.  
The task was to incorporate as much of what was discussed into the desired design. The homework was to present the changes to the student. The goal was to complete the first iteration of the suit by next week, so they could wear it for their first combat training.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really don't like to write speeches and character introductions. Guess what the current chapter of "New World" is completely made of.  
If you want to comfort me, that I did good enough here: this is also Setting and way less Exposition.


	4. School is not like real life

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just had an epiphany: with all the time I'm spending at home I can
> 
> PLAY VIDEO GAMES!  
Next Chapter will be in the year 2525

Lena had drawn Roy Harper. Like discussed in class, she wanted to include a heavy metal brace/guard for his right arm, that would compensate for his left one, that was nearly 3kg heavier than the other one, due to his quirk. She had already taken his measurements and was rasping the thick metal slab into the right dimension, before she could give it its final shape, when Kara came in. She tapped Lena's shoulder, who had been wearing the proper protective gear, including a headset to shield her ears of the shrieking of metal being rasped. Lena fell off her chair in the most ungraceful way possible slinging the container with the chipped off metal-shaving right into Kara's smile. Kara caught Lena, before she could hit the floor, half laughing half coughing out metal.

Lena took a few moments to realize, she had not just injured Kara, who was trying to get a few of the chips out of her hair.  
“Why did you come here?”  
“Hi, was wondering, if you could help us out with homework?”  
“What? Sure! Why are you asking me? What kind of homework?”  
“Thank you!”, Kara hugged her, “It's sociology and criminology. Brainy and I can do science, Nia and James got us covered in art and literature, but none of us are that good in history and sociology. Now Brainy can catch up in history quick enough with one of his quirks, but...”  
“You don't have to justify yourself for needing help once in a while. Humans are social animals. But why did you go to me?”  
“Brainy kind of looked at the test-scores to see, who could help us best and could best afford the time.”  
“I'm … flattered. I think. If it was 'Brainies' idea, why didn't he ask for my help.”  
“Oh, right! You haven't even met the studygroup yet!”  
-  
And so she did. There were Kara, the blue boy, she had seen in the video of the entrance exam, “Brainy” or Querl Dox. Nia Nal had also been in the video, projecting energy-chains to attack her enemies. To Lena's chagrin James was also part of Kara's study-group.  
Barry had assembled another studygroup of his own: Jefferson Jackson, who was the other half to Professor Stein, Roy Harper and to her surprise Caitlin Snow. The girl had been so solitary, that despite it only being her first day, she had already gotten several Ice-queen related nicknames.

As for the homework, they had invited her to help her them with: They didn't really need the help. For this week it was a short essay on “Good-Samaritan-Laws” and the history of professional heroes.  
“What did you bring her for? She's got better stuff to do than helping us with middle-school level stuff.”  
Kara had tried to 'subtly' get James to stop talking and now resorted to loudly shushing him.  
“Judging by the difficulty of the other homework, this week is mainly to insure, that we are all on the same level. It is smart to introduce Ms. Luthor to our study-group early, so we can better ask for her help, once it is needed.”  
“Nice try, Brainy but that's not why Kara invited Lena, is it?”, Nia realized.  
“Fine, I saw her sitting alone in the work-shop, so wanted her to come to game-night!”,Kara admitted.  
“Game-night?”  
“You just went behind our backs!”  
“Game-night?”  
While the others were arguing with Kara, whether she could just invite somebody without consulting the rest and Lena contemplated making her escape, Winn Schott came in.  
“Oh, hi Lena! I didn't know you were coming to game-night. I thought you wouldn't be interested.”  
“I didn't know I would be coming to game-night, either. Kara said, she wanted my help for her study-group.”  
“Guess she made you her new friend.”  
“I am not her friend.”  
“You don't get a say in this. That's just how it works with Kara.”  
-  
And so Lena played boardgames with Kara's friends. At first, she pretended, she wasn't enjoying herself, because she had been roped in under false pretense. That lasted for only a few minutes. Kara had paired herself up with her and now they were steamrolling the others in a game, that had taken inspiration from Trivial-Pursuit and Taboo. One team-member had to explain a highly specialized concept and the other had to guess, what they were talking about. The subjects gave different amounts of points, depending on how likely they were for a normal person to know.  
While Winn and Brainy were both knowledgeable enough to consistently go for the most valuable subject their time often ran out with zero points and them shouting at each other, that they explained it wrong.  
While Nia and James were much better at communicating, they had to mostly stick to the single-point-subjects.  
Lena her finger in front of her mouth and blew over it.  
“Coandâ-effect!”  
Lena slammed her the card down and drew the next.  
“Why is a clock worth more, than an entire ingot of metal?”  
“Labor-theory-of-value!”  
Next card. The others were staring slack jawed.  
“Manual photography.”  
“Camera Obscura!”  
Next card.  
“Are we sure, she's not just somehow reading the card”, Nia asked.  
“Unlikely. Winslow and I spent the great deal of time ensuring, that the cards had a constant density. Kara's ability to see ambient radiation should not provide her any advantage.”  
In the time Brainy had explained that, Kara had guessed 'Hogwarts'. It was only one point but this card had been bad. One subject had been 'Q'. Lena had the gut-feeling, that it wasn't referring to the letter.  
-  
Lena quickly turned her competitiveness down, much to Kara's protest. Though she did admit, that it was much more fun, when there was at least a chance, that the others could win.  
And it was fun. There were jokes. It was funny to listen to James and Nia trying to catch up and attempt to explain something, the other apparently never heard of, or witnessing Winn and Braining becoming friends, despite rarely seeing eye to eye.  
“Pioneer in the field of gun-control, idolized by a political party, that claims to be fundamentally against gun-control.”  
“Ronald Reagan?”  
“Naturally.”  
“Why not just say 'Actor-President'?”  
And they were at it again.  
It was fun. Until that subject came.  
“Uses quantum-field-effect discovered by Lex Luthor to restrain suspects. Recent invention.”  
“Blocker-cuffs. Really? Luthor discovered the Kord-effect?”  
“Why else would I say it? Though I simply drew my information from Wikipedia without checking”, said Brainy.  
“That's so typical”, groaned Lena. Brainy heard that: “Are you saying, my information is incorrect?”  
“Yes! Why do you think it's called 'Kord-effect'. Ted didn't care much about the money, but ever since Lex accepted the Nobel-prize for his work, he avoids the family.”  
“Lex Luthor has been awarded a Nobel-prize? How do I not know this?”  
“Because when the committee found out, they disallowed him and gave it to Ted with an apology.”  
“That sounds, like I would know about it. Have you considered the possibility, that you are envious or jealous?”  
Kara spoke up: “I can't speak for this specific subject, but my sister had worked with Lex and from I heard, he's the type of asshole, that would do something like that.”  
Winn had been looking something up on his smartphone and now showed the result to Brainy.  
“This appears to be intentional”, to Lena he said: “It appears a user edited the pages about the Kord-effect, Dr. Kord and Lex Luthor to downplay Dr. Kord's involvement in its discovery and make it seem as if awarding him with the prize had been the mistake. These changes are made frequently by accounts that appear to made specifically to make Lex Luthor appear as positive as possible. I've requested to lock the relevant articles. Though without strong evidence the culprit cannot be forced to stop.”  
Lena nearly got whiplash from how quickly Brainy had switched from “You're just jealous” to pretty much implying her brother employed a bot-net to twist reports about himself.  
The others came around as well, but took considerably longer. “Are you seriously accusing him of slandering his partner?”  
“No, there is not enough proof for serious accusation. I am merely suspecting Lex Luthor to be practicing libel. More precisely encouraging or coercing somebody to commit libel.”  
Lena felt weird. She had not asked for this, but here she was in a group of hero-students, the most promising of which had just lied to defend her against her brother's reputation.  
Of course Kara had lied. Even if her sister had to work with her brother, she was surely buried in NDAs to prevent her from losing a single word about it much less bad mouthing him.  
Kara, who had pretended, that she wanted to use her for homework, but really had just seen her working alone and decided, that she could use friends.  
She alone was reason enough for Lena to return, if she was invited again.  
Then there were the others. Winslow Schott II was an odd one. On one side he was shy, demure and frightful. He saw himself as weak and even stupid, when he was amidst his fellow students, ignoring not only, that he was among the brightest of his generation, but he was very often right, when he disagreed with them. And all of that went out of the window, when it wasn't about him. Due to his posture it was easy to underestimate his strength. When Jack had set the speed of his drill to high, Winn had grabbed a large plastic bag and tackled him out of the way, before the drill head could destroy a large number of his bots.  
In class he was willing to side with Felicity against Prof. Stein and Mr. Palmer.  
And just now he spoke against a boy, who had the knowledge of the entire internet at his disposal.  
Nia Nal was a passionate girl. The only hero-student, with a less 'impressive' quirk was James. That had not stopped her from being one of the best heroes in her class. She was a beacon, not of hope, but of determination. Lena had learned, that early in her entrance exam Nia had received a sprained ankle. Instead of letting that stop her, she had used her quirk to stabilize her leg and beat the ass of the boy, that had done it.  
Brainy was weird. His name was Querl Dox, but he had already picked his superhero name “Brainiac 5” and had declared in class, that he wanted to be addressed this way declaring “Just Brainiac” as sufficient. He had accepted “Brainy” in a friendly environment. Similar to Kara, he had a multitude of abilities granted to him by his quirk. In short he was a living computer: he could interface with all forms of digital technology. He could “phase” into computers and machines to control them. If a skill could be expressed in a deterministic algorithm, he could master it in seconds. He easily anticipated his peers' actions during both the exam and the training exercises.  
But he also showed clear signs of autism. He had trouble recognizing and expressing his emotions to the point he could be mistaken for a psychopath. It was worse with the emotions of others. Everything beyond simple conditioning a lâ “you hurt him, so he doesn't like you” had to be explained to him. Which did not went well with his empathy. While it didn't enable him to understand others it caused him pain, when he realized others were in pain. This appeared to be a side-effect of his quirk. All of his emotions seemed to manifest as measurable physical symptoms.  
His normally blue color would change to green, when he was “in the zone” during which his already lacking social abilities became nonexistent.  
And last and least there was James. He was still just James. So far the school had been just a few days, but Lena still considered it a miracle, that he was still enrolled.  
-  
After somehow remaining on speaking terms after a game of Monopoly the group dispersed. Brainy simply walked out without a word, returning a few seconds later to drop of an awkward “bye”. Winn, Nia and James were talking to each other, still half seated.  
Kara accompanied Lena out.  
“Thank you.”  
“I should thank you! I lured you here and you stayed the whole time, even though you have so much to do. I mean you're no older than I am and already leading your own charity organization and than there's your homework for school. Not that I don't have that, but I told you we'd be working on that and we really were not and were here the entire evening.”  
“No Kara. Thank you. For inviting me. And for defending me against my brother. You even lied for me, even though you barely know me!”  
“What? Why do you think I lied? I mean aside from when I said 'study-group'. But I was honest: I did want you to be part of the study-group.”  
“Even if your sister was working with my brother, I'd think she has the professionalism to not speak of it in private.”  
“Well... my sister does have the professionalism not to mention any specifics. I mean, I still don't know where she currently works. But your brother keeps calling her when she's not on duty.”  
“Please tell me you're trying to make me laugh.”  
“She always tells him, that 'this is not a secure line, sir. Do not use it, unless it is an emergency. If you need me at the base, use the beeper.' but I can still hear him and he's famous, so I recognize his voice.”  
That sounded a lot like Lex. He would happily jeopardize the secrecy of whatever they were working on, so that he could scapegoat her for any failures, that occurred. From an outside perspective it appeared, that she was the one, that had leaked information.  
“Listen. Non of us are supposed to know about this, so you should make sure, that your friends keep quiet. If word gets out he'll blame your sister.”  
“How do you handle living with him?”  
“By mostly working around him, never with or against him.”  
“That sounds … tiring.”  
“It is. Can I tell you something confidential?”  
“You trust me to keep your secrets?”  
“I guess? I'd just really like to tell somebody, and so far you've been a nice person for no other reason, than being nice.”  
Kara blushed.  
“Thanks. If you need somebody to talk to, you can always come to me. But to be honest, I am not good at lying, like at all, so if anybody asks me, you should consider your secret out.”  
Lena thought for a moment.  
“Lex already knows. So here goes nothing: I deliberately do impressive things in a way, so that they can't be compared to Lex' accomplishments. He became a pianist, I learned violine. He became a chessmaster, I played goo against the world champions. He became a hero for publicity, I'll safe more people than he ever did.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just to make sure: that up top was a joke About how slow I update.  
I do intend to continue this story soonish.


	5. Heart to heart

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really don't like doing the integral parts of writing a story (character establishment).  
Was it at least worth the work

Kara didn't know what to make of Lena's confession. They had both pretended, that that talk after game-night hadn't happened, but Lena appeared … relieved. She smiled noticeably more.  
That had been one week ago. Since then there had been two game nights, where they had all become better friends.  
It was Friday evening, the third Game-night this week and Kara was distracted. She couldn't quite put her finger on to why, but her attention always drifted away from whatever they were playing to ... “Kara! That's five! You have to draw.”  
Lena had been hesitant to play a game that required them to quickly hit a bell with somebody with super speed and super strength, but this was the sixth time she had missed the cue.  
Winn was holding the draw-pile to her. Brainy appeared to be sympathetic: “I assume you are distracted by your sister's presence here?”  
“She is here?” the rest of the table gawked.  
“In Headmaster Nezu's office. I'm trying really hard not to listen in.”  
“Why? Whatever she's doing here, it has to have to do with us, or she wouldn't be in the headmaster's office”, Lena reasoned.  
“Your argument disregards the possible relevance of other students, but I do believe, that your conclusion is nonetheless correct.”  
With her classmates encouraging her to do so, it was impossible for Kara not to eavesdrop on her sister:  
“Are you enjoying the tea, Agent? Is my fur nice and fluffy?”  
“I can tell the difference between normal pleasantries and you trying to hold me off. Why?”  
“Because after what you've told me, I found that I can't discuss that with you alone. It should only take a moment until the rest of the teachers at the meeting-room.”  
–  
“Would you please explain them, why you are here?”  
“You guarantee that they will be able to keep it confidential? … Ok. Among your student is one, that is of integral interest for the DEO. The student was allowed to enroll like a civilian, because at the time the risk had been estimated to be minimal. Due to recent findings this estimation has been amended two hours ago. I would like to stay at this institute to act as a contact for this student, ensure their safety and try and make sure that any disturbance regarding this student has minimal effect on their classmates.”  
“Is this student a key witness, or something?”, Cementos asked.  
“In a sense. They...”, before Alex could continue she was interrupted by something Kara could not make out. Alex sighted and spoke again: “Since it apparently is only a matter of time until the students themselves find out I guess it doesn't make much sense to withhold this information from you. The student in question is Brainiac 5 or to go by his civilian alias 'Querl Dox'. He was to be part of on organized crime syndicate. Technically he, and every other member of this group, the 'Brainiacs', are Nomou. You see the founder of this group worked with Dr. Kyudai Garaki. That was decades ago and we have reason to believe that it was in fact him and not All For One, that kick started the invention of the Nomou. We don't know when, but at least thirty years ago they successfully created 'Brainiac 1'. A being, that among many others had several intelligence enhancing quirks. It broke of ties with All For One early enough that we never had any idea, they had ever worked together and completely restructured their own organization. From then on all the members received the name 'Brainiac' together with a number that was a metric of how good 'Brainiac 1' considered them to be, with the only non-artificially created member being the former leader, who had kept his knowledge tightly under wraps, so he wouldn't be disposed, thus gaining him the name 'Brainiac 3'. Fast forward a few years and Brainiac 5 is created. Even though he is much more capable than number 4 and 2 he is called 5 due to his scruples. Which he listens to, giving crucial tips to us and turning against his siblings in the ensuing raid. It is not really surprising, that 'Brainiac 1' escaped. 'Brainiac 8' was also unaccounted for. As for the one that held the knowledge to make more: He is dead. From what we gathered 'Brainiac 6' had attempted to climb the ranks by torturing the secret out of him and when the raid started he didn't want to take chances.”  
“And what is the risk you speak of specifically?”, Midnight wanted to know.  
“'Brainiac 8'. Highly capable but to homicidal even for a criminal cult. We have reason to believe, that she found someone who is supplying her with money and equipment. It is almost certain, that she knows of Brainiac 5. She might be planning revenge. We might have to draft him to help us again.”  
The teachers spoke over each other trying expressing how opposed they were to drafting a student, especially one, who was in his first year and hadn't even gotten his provisional license yet.  
“Do you think I WANT something to happen to my sister's classmates? I never said I wasn't also for selfish reasons here. I am certain, that as soon as we have a trace Brainiac 5 will insist on helping us and I know that my sister will try to join him. I'd like to talk them both out of it.”  
There was a short silence, until Nezu gave his verdict: “I see your point. Here is my offer: We have three positions for teachers. Technically part time, but I expect you and the up to two agents you want to deploy to actually contribute to this school, when we are not in crisis as well. I also want to have a veto on who you bring, and naturally they must either have a valid hero license or a title I can see as equivalent.”  
“Wonder-woman.”  
Most of the teachers didn't seem to know that name, however Nezu did: “Isn't she a vigilante without license?”  
“She had one three years ago and I can't think of anybody better at protecting people.”  
Nezu's answer was interrupted by the door opening.  
“I need a teaching position at your school”, a female voice Kara was not familiar with demanded.  
“I don't recall asking for your help”, Alex said in obvious annoyance.  
“To bad. Gideon did an update with Charlie and the result was pretty clear: You're about to get in way over your head and we'll have a global civil war on our hands.”  
“A civil war? Forgive my disbelieve, but my worst-case scenario was not a civil war.”  
“The forecast was pretty clear: one student here dies, another takes revenge, the resulting conflict envelops the planet.”  
“Shouldn't you be going after the murderer?”  
“You know, it's not this easy. We tried to ID them, but... all we got are the victim and the other student.”  
“So? If you want me to accept your bullshit, you have to tell me everything.”  
“Is this room secure?”  
“We have to assume that my sister is listening”, Alex admitted. Kara couldn't hear what was happening next, but presumably the unknown woman was writing something down and showing it to Alex and Nezu.  
“She is the third agent”, Alex said in a strict tone “If you fuck up, I'll kill you, till you're dead.”  
Presumably she had left, because then Nezu said: “Great, will I get your documents from you or from Agent?”  
“Ehm, do you mind if I forge them or the dates don't add up? Officially I don't exist right now.”  
–  
“What the fuck?”, Winn said what everyone was thinking. They were staring at Brainy.  
“I do not know, why you are looking at me? I think Agent, or technically Kara, said everything of note.”  
They still stared, but nobody found themselves able to asked anything, that wasn't redundant, so to their own disbelief they moved on: “Who the hell are these other two new teachers?”  
“Wonder-woman is an American vigilante. A quite popular theory suggests she is the former hero and current musician Linda Carter”, before Brainy could continue Kara interrupted him: “You want to tell me, that Linda Carter is a vigilante?”  
“I mean”, Lena said “have you SEEN her?” They both pulled out their phones. Kara quickly found a picture, that gave her an idea, what Lena was talking about. The singer and violinist usually wore wide flowing dresses, but in this picture a low camera angle and wind revealed legs that could kick down concrete walls. Then Lena showed Kara her phone. It was a video a young girl had tried to subtly make in a gym. The caption read “So I'm in the same hotel as Linda Carter”. The girl was in the foreground, but she did her best to keep the camera trained on the musician. In the short and tight workout clothes her muscles were undeniable. Her arms put most male pro-heroes to shame. She evidently stuffed her bra, when on stage, because her chest consisted almost entirely of her pecs. There was nothing on her that jiggled as she finished her warm-up. The she picked up an 80 kg dumbbell, lifted like it was nothing and started doing squats.  
“Is her quirk some kind of strength enhancement?”, Winn asked. He was evidently not a fan.  
“No, it's called dance party. She is licensed to use it during closed of events”, Nia supplied.  
“What does it do?”  
“This.” she showed him a video of a concert. The entire first block was doing a dance-routine that would a dedicated crew half a year to learn.  
-  
The tried the rest of the evening to figure out, who the other woman had been, but even Brainy hacking the schools security feeds had brought up nothing. As she had said: she officially didn't exist.  
\---  
One week later and Lena and Winn would be the first in their group to find out.  
“Good morning class. I'd like you all to met your new history teacher, as well as supervisor for the voluntary self-defense course, my former colleague … by what name do you currently go?”  
“Cap... Sara Lance. I used to be a pro for a subsidiary of Queen Consolidated but after I joined certain bureau I was removed from all official records. As Ray, ehm, I mean Atom said, I'll be your history teacher and if you so chose self-defense instructor. Any questions?”  
“Can you tell us, what your quirk is?”, one pert student asked from the back.  
“No.” And she was gone.  
–  
Wonder-woman was the sports teacher for the hero-course and judging by how exhausted even Barry and Kara were, she wasn't going easy on them.  
Sara Lance' lessons were mixed. To nobodies surprise her combat abilities were extremely good to the point where she could even keep students with overpowered quirks in check and she was a decent instructor herself.  
History with her was a mess. She would often get mayor historical events wrong only to correct herself shortly after seeing the students reactions. On the other side she was acutely aware of small details, that turned out to be perfectly in line with historical records. Then Brainy suddenly found records of her: on the other side of the world she was officially serving time in prison for vigilantism. The pictures he found showed a much younger woman, in fact she didn't appear to be adult yet. Even though the girl in the picture had brown hair and their teacher was much paler, they were undeniably either the same person or siblings.  
–  
As time went on Kara became more familiar with Jack. Much to Lena's disappointment it would be an overstatement to say they became friends, but Jack got along with her new friends and seemed to approve of them. One day he pulled Kara aside to talk to her, while Lena couldn't hear them: “Please stop trying to be my friend.”  
“What? Why? Don't you want friends?”  
“I do have friends, but the only reason we interact, is because we both like Lena?”  
“See, we like the same...”  
“No. I like her for the things she has in common with her brother: Her ingenuity, her willingness to be blunt and even outright rude to get the message across and admittedly also her looks. You like her for the ways she is different to her brother.”  
Kara wanted to correct him. It was obvious, that Jack too had a strong philanthropic spirit. And she felt nearly insulted, when he suggested, that she didn't like Lena the scientist. Then she remembered how bad she was at taking social cues and decided to ask her sister first.  
-  
“It's childish, but I think it's because he's her ex.”  
“What does that have to do with it?”  
Alex pretended to think long and hard about her answer: “Listen: I am stuck here babysitting Brainiac and by extension your class and I've got as company my old boss, Ray Palmer and Sara fucking Lance. Call me mean but if I have to leave you clueless to get entertainment I'll do it. Look at it as a learning experience.”  
“But... Fine I guess I'll ask...”  
“Hey don't be like that. Let me give you some advice: Don't tell Lena about this and don't ask Jack what he was on about.”  
–  
Kara could spend all day watching Lena play the piano. Of course she sometimes joined in singing, but Lena always asked her to make sure there were no witnesses. Right now she was playing Claire de Lune from Debussy and Kara remembered the first time Lena had played on the piano:  
Nobody really knew, why there was a piano without a chair in an unoccupied room in their dorm, but nobody cared enough to ask anybody who might know.  
So one day Lena wanted to be alone, again, and started playing to herself standing in the empty room. Kara heard it from outside and silently came in.  
When Lena had finished playing, they had both opened their eyes and found her sitting on Kara's lap, who in turn was hovering in front of the piano. Ever since then they came to this room together. They rarely spoke about it, but they could both tell, that the other enjoyed it as much as they did.

Lena had so far not regretted trusting Kara. Quite the opposite. It had been several weeks since she had shared her not quite secret with her and not only had Kara not passed it on, she also had remained a close friend instead of shying away. She had never found out, what had caused her burst of honesty, but what ever it was, it made her feel comfortable around the gifted blonde. The first time she had found herself sitting on her lap, she had felt somewhat embarrassed, but now, only a few weeks later, she always made sure that there was never a chair in the room, before she started playing.  
Today she could tell, something was on the mind of the girl she most definitely didn't have a crush on. After a few pieces with her singing Lena idly jingled and shifted slightly on Kara's lap so she could look at her: “Do you want to tell me, what's on your mind?”  
Kara thought about her answer for a long time. She wrapped her arms around Lena like a teddy bear, making her feel all kinds of warm.  
“I tried to become friends with Jack.”  
“Why? The two of you have nothing in common.”  
“We both like you.”  
Lena could feel herself blush, until she realized that her friend was to oblivious to notice and make the connection.  
“Can you promise me, not to talk to him about what I'm about to tell you?”  
“Why?”  
“It might be a sore subject for him. I guess if he would specifically ask you could... But I'd rather you don't.”  
“Okay...”  
“You know, that Jack is my ex-boyfriend?”  
“Yes?”  
“Do you know, how we became a thing and why it ended?”  
“I never thought to ask.”  
“Back when I could finally convince mother, that my social skills would suffer, were I not to spend a sufficient amount of time amongst my peers, she enrolled me in a boarding school. In a sense the reason we got together was the same as the reason I like hanging out with your friends and you: whereas most of the school saw my last name, some familiar with my brother, others thinking of my parents, Jack recognized my skill. The first half year he didn't want anything to do with me, outside of group-projects of course. At some point we were hit by puberty and realized that the other was an attractive person of similar age. And even later I realized, that Jack's feelings for me were … superficial.”  
“You don't mean like literally, do you?”  
She chuckled: “No, of course not. I just couldn't find a better word. It was... he never quite got me...”  
“You're not into robotics.”  
Kara had to hold onto Lena, because she nearly fell out of her lap laughing: “That was the argument, that caused us to break up. He had signed us both up for the schools robot-war team, which barely left enough time for my surgery training.”  
“You're a surgeon?”  
“Everybody is a surgeon, if they perform surgery! No, I'm not a licensed surgeon, I just self taught some anatomy, trained on some butcher refuse and interned with a vet.”  
“What about first responder training?”  
“That … would have been a good idea. On the other hand, if any of my classmate want their appendix removed I think I've got it.”  
“What changed?”  
“Hm?”  
“You've made these preparations to go into medicine, but now you're here.”  
“My interest in medicine hasn't gone down. It's just that I realized, that I'll do more good as an inventor.”  
“I agree. You're work will probably save more lives than mine!”  
“Aw, Thanks.”  
“Is that, what you want to do?”  
“What?”  
“I didn't forget, what you told me.”  
'No', Lena screamed internally.  
“How you shape your live after your brother.”  
'STOP'  
“Helping people. Do you want to do it, or did Lex make you want to?”  
Lena cried for the first time in conscious memory, here in the safest place in the universe.  
“I don't know!”  
“Just promise me to tell me, when you find out.”


End file.
